A DREAM COME TRUE
EVERY ONCE IN A WHILE, an idea thwacks you from left field. In my case, the impact was all the greater for being encapsulated in a single word: fastpacking. Yes, I’d done backpacking before; and yes, I’d done fellrunning. But the idea of a hybrid sport seemed absurd. Backpackers totter under rucksacks tall as Manhattan skyscrapers, whereas fell runners go out in singlets and grumble if they have to carry both a cagoule and a cereal bar.
And yet, the idea of moving quickly over mountain terrain with the means to stay high overnight was so beguiling I had to try it. And that meant assembling the kit that would occupy that tiny overlap in the Venn diagram between comfort and portability. During lockdown, it became an obsessive dream – I saw myself perfecting the tireless lope of the wolf over the hills, then unfurling my den to
